"It is an interesting prototype that would definitely complement our transport capability in the event of a crisis or war with large patient flows" says Magnus Lindström from the Swedish Armed Forces Centre for Defence Medicine in Gothenburg.
As part of strengthening the total defence in the event of a crisis or war, the regional
principal for public transport in the Västra Götaland region – Västtrafik, has developed a bus to transport lying patients.
"This is the result of a regional investigative assignment due to our task within the total defence to be able to transport or evacuate large numbers of patients in the event of a crisis or, in the worst case" says Joakim Östling, Security Protection Manager and Security Strategist for Civil Defence at Västtrafik.
The concept bus is an ordinary city bus that can be converted in less than three hours and, with the help of a modular interior, can transport lying patients. The prototype has an interior that can accommodate ten stretchers, where the dimensions of the stretchers are based on NATO's standard for field stretchers.
"We have developed a proof of concept that is intended to be as flexible and independent as possible so that we can support different actors depending on the event. We provide the bus, and it should fit personnel from both civilian healthcare and military healthcare" says Joakim Östling.
Among others, the Swedish Armed Forces Centre for Defence Medicine in Gothenburg has already received a presentation of the concept bus. Within the Swedish Armed Forces Centre for Defence Medicine, there are various units with both healthcare personnel and logisticians, as well as research and development.
"We got on board and saw the modular interior and thus also started thinking about how we could work in such a bus and conduct medical transport with a high level of care" says doctors Johan Törngren and Martin Stenerös.
Another part of the transport system regarding large-scale patient transportation over long distances is using trains, which is something Västtrafik has already started looking into. Trains have significantly greater capacity in terms of the number of patients and can handle multiple levels of care. Using trains for large-scale evacuation of patients is not new but was operational during the Cold War within Swedish total defence. Now there is a need to regain the ability to use trains for patient transportation, a need that NATO has also identified. That NATO is working to create the ability to use trains for patient evacuation became clear to Swedish total defence during the exercises Casualty Move 2024 (CAMO24) and National Seminar Exercise 2024 (NSÖ24), which were conducted in September in Enköping.
Lessons from developing the bus as a concept vehicle for stretcher transport mean that many parts can be directly applied to developing trains for the same purpose, with the synergy effects this entails. A train in regional traffic converted to medical transport is a dynamic transport resource and could provide a capacity of up to 150 lying patients on stretchers, or in another configuration 70 stretcher places and 10 intensive care places. Adaptation should be able to take place according to needs with existing and portable equipment and should be able to be converted at very short notice.